ASX chief urges Gillard to push Asia finance link

ASX
chief executive
Elmer Funke Kupper
has urged the government to forge deeper ties with Asia to secure Australia’s economic future and cement the country’s role as a regional financial centre.

A day after meeting Prime Minister
Julia Gillard
, Mr Funke Kupper denied the ASX had any plans to reprise last year’s failed takeover by the Singapore Exchange, but said Asia was the way forward for Australia’s financial markets.

In a blow to the government’s plans to promote Australia as a financial centre in Asia, the stock exchange chief said the country was a long way from achieving its ambition.

“We talk about being a financial centre, but of course we are not," Mr Funke Kupper told The Australian Financial Review. “We have a real opportunity, more than any other western country right now, to get that [the engagement with Asia] right.

“We are in the right region, we are strong economically, we have a very good financial market, and we are well regulated. We should grab the opportunity."

In a controversial decision, the federal government blocked the $8 billion takeover of the ASX by the Singapore Exchange in April last year on the grounds that it was not in Australia’s national interest.

Mr Funke Kupper, a former boss of gaming company Tabcorp, joined the ASX six months later in October.

He held his first formal meeting with the Prime Minister as ASX chief on Tuesday, but said the failed deal was not broached in the discussions.

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However, Mr Funke Kupper said Australia needed to engage more deeply with Asia if it was to benefit from the region’s stronger growth prospects.

“At the end of the day, it [the Singapore deal] was rejected and we will move along running the company. What’s done is done," he said.

“Having said that, I think it begs a deeper question of what our game plan is for Australia when it comes to Asia," he added.

“The choice we have to make about the country is not about the next three years or this electoral cycle, it is for the next 10 to 15 years.

“And our policy settings and the way we work together to execute it has to last that long."

After the Singapore deal was blocked, the ASX hired Ms Gillard’s former chief of staff, Amanda Lampe, to repair its relationship with the government.

While the government has said that its rejection of the Singapore takeover did not rule out future deals in­volving the ASX, Mr Funke Kupper said it was too early for the exchange to consider another opportunity.

“I think it is important that we don’t have unnecessary hurdles. Whether we ever do something or try something again, I think it is too early for me to speculate on," he said.

“The pressure for exchange con­solidation will continue. We can’t ignore it. What we are trying to fig­ure out is what our role should be in that."

With Europe’s debt crisis deepening and the recovery in the United States showing signs of strain, Mr Funke Kupper said conditions on financial markets were still very challenging.

However, Asia was a brighter spot amid the gloom.

“The contagion that we are seeing from Europe is actually more a psychological one than a real one," Mr Funke Kupper said.

“Almost every news bulletin we look at talks about Europe, whereas actually as a country we are much more dependent on Asia."